Colonel William A. Phillips

The Leavenworth Constitution was one of four Kansas state constitutions proposed during the era of Bleeding Kansas. The Leavenworth Constitution was drafted by a convention of Free-Staters, and was the most progressive of the four proposed constitutions. The conspicuous aspects of this Constitution were a Bill of Rights that referred to "all men" (making no distinction between the rights of white men and black men), the banning of slavery from the state, and a basic framework for the rights of women.


The Leavenworth Constitution did not have a great impact on the history of Kansas since the US Senate did not approve of the codified laws in the written document. The other proposed state constitutions were the Topeka Constitution (1855), the Lecompton Constitution (1857) and the Wyandotte Constitution (1859).

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